Alessandro Petacchi

Alessandro Petacchi
	Alessandro Petacchi 2015
To person
Nickname	Ale jet
Date of birth	3rd January 1974 (age 46)
nation	Italy
discipline	Street
Driver type	sprinter
End of career	2015
doping
2007	Salbutamol
Team (s)
1996–1999 ; 2000–2005 ; 2006–2008 ; 2008–2009 2010– ; April 2013 ; August 2013–2014 ; 2015	Scrigno-Blue Storm ; Fassa Bortolo ; Team Milram ; L.PR Brakes ; Lampre ; Omega Pharma-Quick-Step ; Southeast
Most important successes
	Milan – Sanremo; 6 stages and 1 × points evaluation Tour de France; 22 stages and 2 × points evaluation Giro d'Italia; 20 stages and 1 × points evaluation Vuelta a España
	Last updated: May 15, 2019

Alessandro Petacchi during training for the prologue of the Tour de France 2010 in Rotterdam

Around the Henninger Tower 2006

Alessandro Petacchi (born January 3, 1974 in La Spezia ) is a former Italian cyclist .

The most important successes of the successful sprinter in road racing include winning the green jersey of the Tour de France 2010 , a total of 48 stage victories in three major tours , including six in the Tour de France , 22 in the Giro d'Italia plus five retrospectively withdrawn and 20 in the event the Vuelta a España and the victory at Milan – San Remo in 2005.

Sporty profile and development

Petacchi turned pro in 1996. After he had sprint successes in smaller bike races in the early years of his career , he experienced his breakthrough in 2003: After numerous successes in the spring, he was only the third driver ever - after Miguel Poblet in 1956 and Pierino Baffi in 1958 - to win all three “Grand Tours ”win stages within a year. First he achieved six stage wins at the Giro d'Italia . He then won four times at the Tour de France and six times at the Vuelta a España .

He continued his series of successes in major country tours over the next few years: by 2011 he had won a total of 22 stages in the Giro d'Italia , six in the Tour de France and 20 in the Vuelta a España . Particularly noteworthy are his nine stage victories at the Giro d'Italia 2004 , with which he set a record for the post-war period. Petacchi was also able to win the points classification of these races once : 2004 the Maglia ciclamino des Giro, 2005 at the Vuelta and 2010 at the Tour.

Petacchi's successes in the years 2000 to 2005 were based not least on the strategy of his Fassa Bortolo team to put together a sprint train that was tailor-made for Petacchi with several, permanently positioned drivers.

Petacchi was also successful in the classics : he won the Milan – Sanremo sprint in 2005, ahead of Danilo Hondo and Paris-Tours in 2007 , supported by his team-mate Erik Zabel .

In April 2013 he announced his immediate end to his career and terminated his contract with the Lampre-Merida team , but continued his career from August 1, 2013 with the Omega Pharma-Quick-Step Cycling Team , where he was a driver in the sprint train for Mark Cavendish was committed. He stayed there until the end of the 2014 season and eventually moved to Team Southeast .

In June 2015, at the age of 41, Petacchi announced the end of his career. The reason he gave was that in view of a viral disease that would not heal, he saw no point in continuing.

Doping ban and suspected doping

After the Giro d'Italia 2007 it became known that Alessandro Petacchi tested positive for salbutamol during the eleventh stage . Although he was able to present an exemption that allowed him to take this substance up to a certain limit value, the controls found that this value was exceeded. After the Italian Olympic Committee opened an investigation into Petacchi and scheduled a hearing, Petacchi was suspended from his team Milram in late June. After the acquittal by the Italian Cycling Federation, the Italian Olympic Committee appealed to the CAS .

On May 5, 2008, the CAS banned him retrospectively for ten months to August 31, 2008 after the two-month investigation period during which he had not driven had been offset against the annual ban that was actually to be imposed. In addition, his Giro successes from 2007 (five stage wins and points evaluation) and all results since November 1, 2007 have been canceled. The court did not assume that Petacchi was intent on doping fraud, but instead pronounced the ban due to the disregard of the UCI regulations and the special permission to use salbutamol. As a result, the contract between Alessandro Petacchi and the Milram team was terminated on May 16, 2008 by “mutual agreement”.

In July 2010, Petacchi came under suspicion of doping again. The public prosecutor in Padua accused him of using the blood doping agent perfluorocarbon .

As part of the investigation of the "Operation Aderlass" around the German sports doctor Mark Schmidt , Petacchi came under suspicion again in May 2019 of having violated anti-doping regulations. In August 2019 he was banned from the World Cycling Federation (UCI) for two years.